Member Info for tichtich

That's where I heard about itn

Well, I wasn't going to buy any more BSIF, as I was already overweight renewables including a good-sized holding of BSIF. But BSIF stood out like a sore thumb today as my only holding in the red for the day. The price has just got silly, at 97.5p. That's a discount of 28% to latest NAV, and a forward yield of 9% (probably still 2x covered). Also, gas prices (which have probably contributed to the falling share price) have been creeping back up, though that could easily change again. I can't help feeling that the reason BSIF has been particularly singled out is because some platforms have been warning potential buyers about it or even blocking them from buying it altogether! (See https://citywire.com/investment-trust-insider/news/aj-bell-blunders-deepen-row-over-fair-value-restrictions-on-trusts/a2440235)

Yes, GSEO seems incredibly cheap: 8% yield with under 60% of capital deployed and virtually no leverage. And if I understood correctly, it claims that all its contracts are fully inflation linked. I noticed that the contracts for its US storage are only 3 years. We just have to assume that there's going to be continued demand for those. And I generally prefer funds with a proven track record. We've seen other new funds turn out to be badly managed. But I'm optimistic enough about this to risk a 3% investment.

I was always rather doubtful about battery storage funds, fortunately as it turned out. I did get into GSF late last year, when it was already at a 40% discount, but later changed my mind, getting out with a modest profit. I think the battery funds are at too much risk of the grid operators changing the rules on them. At least the generating funds like UKW have much of their income covered by subsidies and guaranteed prices. It would be pretty extreme for the government to renege on those. I'm more concerned about their market revenues, as it's the government that sets the rules of the market, and we know those are going to be changed.

Because people don't seem to realise that higher inflation is actually a good reason to buy funds like UKW which have good inflation protection! They'd rather own bonds that pay a very low real (inflation-adjusted) yield.

I went ahead and bought some GSEO, my standard initial position size (about 3% of my total investments).

I've only just discovered GSEO. Strange I haven't come across it before, because I've been looking at a lot of different renewables funds over the last 2 years or so. I currently hold UKW, BSIF and AERI. I wasn't going to buy any more renewables as they already make up over a quarter of my investments. But I have some cash to invest, after taking some profits (not in renewables, needless to say!), and I'm having difficulty finding any thing else I like. I was waiting for a bit of a market pullback. But GSEO looks cheap (even after today's price bump), so I'm thinking of going for it. There's also some diversification benefit, relative to my other renewables.

Good luck!

Nice to see CSN holding today when the rest of the market is down. Relatively speaking that's an increase! I decided to pull the trigger and sell the shares I bought in early December, for a small profit. I got almost 280p. As I wanted to trim my holding anyway, I thought I'd raise some cash now, in case today's drop is the start of a correction. I think we're due for at least a small correction, even if the general trend upwards continues. I still have 5-6% of my portfolio in CSN.

Well, I won't mind too much if the share price just retraces to where it was before, so we get the dividend with no fall in share price overall!

Since I was thinking of reducing my holding a bit, I might sell some just before ex-div day.

I'm tempted by BBGI, as I really like the visibility of its cash flows. But I have difficulty getting past the fact that its inflation linkage is only 0.5. As a recent retiree, I fear inflation!

By the way, don't overlook the disclaimer at the top of the Kepler article: "This is a non-independent marketing communication commissioned by BBGI Global Infrastructure."

Zac, if you're so convinced that you'd be better off switching from LGEN to a global tracker, why not go ahead and do it, before you fall any further behind? There's no time like the present! 😉

Wow! As soon as I posted that it jumped to 275p. That's probably a buy price and it'll soon snap back to the sell price. Still, it's a good sign.

Nice to see a modest rise in share price. It touched 270p today, the first time I've seen that price for a while. I'm still slightly underwater, not counting dividends. I don't usually care that much about the share price, as I'm holding for the dividends, but I thought I might sell a few shares if it goes higher, as I overdid it a bit, at 8% of my portfolio.

I was puzzled by the idea of BSIF falling an FCA "fair value assessment" (thanks for posting, DaveysShares). So I did some googling and found this:

https://www.lemonfool.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=54&t=42922

It looks like it can be safely ignored.

@ToS1963

I think you're missing the fact that after the buyback the company's assets are down by the amount they spent on the shares. That will tend to reduce the share price, and may cancel out the benefit of the increased EPS. I think that's why zac0_4 said that a buyback is a neutral transaction.

However, from my point of view, as a long term investor, the potential benefit of a buyback is not that it could increase the share price in the short term, but that it could increase the long term returns, as measured by long term dividend paying potential. If the shares are being bought back at a price below fair value (fair in terms of long term dividend paying potential), then the buyback is "accretive", meaning that it increases the fair value of the shares. However, even then I wouldn't expect it to increase the market price of the shares in the short term, since Mr Market thinks that the current price is the fair value, so he doesn't agree that the buyback is accretive.

Even if the buyback is accretive, there's a case for saying that the company should instead pay out the same money as an extra dividend, and let shareholders decide for themselves whether to reinvest the dividend by buying more shares in the company. (One counter-argument is that the buyback may be more tax-efficient for shareholders, though that won't be relevant to those of us with our shares in an ISA or SIPP.)

"...his foresight is now paying dividends."

Dividends? Did I miss something? 😉

I was very tempted to add yesterday below 100p. But I've already got 25% of my portfolio in renewable energy funds. I really ought to diversify more. But nothing else I look at seems to be as good risk/reward value. Today I spent some time seriously looking at BBGI. It's probably safer than a renewable energy fund, but lower return and more vulnerable to inflation. I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

Let's hope CSN gets a nice bump from its results, like PHNX did recently. While I don't worry too much about the share price, as I'm in it long term for the dividends, a falling share price makes me worry that Mr Market knows something I don't. Also, I have quite a big CSN position, and no intention of buying more, so a falling share price doesn't help me. Fingers crossed. 🤞

Another old codger here. Only 2 days to my state retirement date! I've already got my bus pass ready to go. 😎

I don't expect to start withdrawing from my investments for a few more years. And then my plan is to only withdraw the dividends. In any case, my strategy is to hold for the long term. If a stock gets overpriced or otherwise unattractive, I'm willing to sell it to buy one that's better value. But I've done too much buying and selling in the past, and I'm trying to keep it to a minimum now. I

currently have no intention of selling my LGEN.

I did sell my SMDS the other day, as it's gone up in expectation of a takeover by MONDI and I don't particularly want to be in MONDI. I'll keep the cash for now, while I look out for a good opportunity.

Thanks for replying, NorthernShark, but I'm not sure I understand. Is the following correct? The smelters are not buying the concentrate; they are just providing a service, being paid to smelt other people's concentrate. And they have too much capacity, so they've been competing for the available business by cutting their service fees. However, they've now agreed among themselves to remove their excess capacity.

But, if this causes the copper price to rise, that implies they will be producing less copper than before. And that seems to imply that there will be concentrate that won't get smelted, in which case there will be less demand for new concentrate, which should be negative for the price of concentrate.

Am I missing something?

If the price of finished copper has gone up because Chinese smelters are cutting production, that doesn't sound good for the price of the copper concentrate that smelters will be using less of. On the other hand, I read that the reason they're cutting production is because the cost of copper concentrate has already gone up and squeezed their margin. So perhaps the good news is the old news, and the latest news is not so good!

(Just thinking out loud based on press reports.)